Gongali Village School

children at the Gongali Village School, built by Primary Schools for Africa in Nov/Dec 2010

Thursday, 27 June 2013

UPDATE - 27 JUNE 13 - AYALABE VILLAGE SCHOOL - CLASSROOMS 1 &2

Hi Friends of Primary Schools For Africa

The below graphic and photos show where we are with fundraising and construction as of 27 June 13

Alan and wife Maureen along with a gaggle of friends are going to Tanzania in September to be a part of the opening celebrations of this new school project, so we are under a little bit of pressure to get the project complete by then. Please help us and the village out by considering a donation; no matter how small.

If you're thinking bigger, remember, a donation of $7,000 will get a classroom named after you or a loved one with the name on a plaque mounted on the classroom wall.

Saturday, 22 June 2013

The construction of the new school project in the village of Ayalabe near Karatu is underway.

DONATIONS ARE NEEDED.

This project was requested by District Chairman Lazarus Titus back in September 2012 (refer to Blog dated Sep 2012) to provide a new school for the village of Ayalabe, near Karatu, Northern Tanzania. The village had gathered some funds over the years and were willing to share in the cost of the project. So we decided at a meeting in May this year that we would build the school buildings (shown on the right below) and the village would fund and build the Teacher Residences (shown on the left).

I completed the site design and provided it along with our standard building design for a 2 classroom building and small office to our Tanzanian agent Mathew for pricing. The cost came back at 29.8 million Tanzanian Shillings (about $18,600 Canadian Dollars) which is close to our previous costs.

The sloped site has been "levelled" sufficiently and the villagers have gathered all the stones that are needed for the foundations. Then the gravel and concrete slab will be placed on top. Concrete footings will be placed at concrete column locations around the perimeter. This method of using stones instead of the western world construction of compacted base and gravel seems to work well enough here. I was concerned about settlement and cracking of the slab, but in all our buildings to date, there haven't been any. Local methods - true and time-tested - they work.

To all our friends, we ask that you consider supporting this project and DONATE generously

As of today, 22 June 2013, we only have about half of the needed $18,600, but we gave it the green light to start construction anyway, and would work on raising the remainder of the funds in the next few months. Construction must be complete by 30 September 2013.